Friday, September 9, 2016

A Most Ridiculous Way to be Paid for Jury Duty - All This for $4.00?!

Both my husband and I were called to jury duty within one week apart. This was the fourth time for both of us in ten years. I almost got stuck on a homicide trial while my husband was in and out of the courthouse in two hours! Regardless, both of us are due a $4.00 transportation reimbursement for our troubles. It used to be that a check was mailed to your address - case closed. NOW you get a Chase Visa Debit card that comes with enough documentation to make your head spin. So we waited until he was through with his service to cash them in. So we went to our Bank of America because it said you can go wherever there are Visa cards. Besides, do ATM's even cash out something as small as $4.00? At first they didn't want to have anything to do with it. Then we said we had an account there and made a case based on the information we received. In the end it took two tellers, a lot of verification, and more paperwork to make this ridiculous transaction. Of course in the end I couldn't get mine done because I did not have my ID on me - we were returning home after a walk this morning and stopped in on the fly. I don't carry all that junk on me when we are out for a walk. So we got half of what we are owed and I bet most people don't even bother - which is probably what the US government is counting on. I'm sure they thought long and hard about all of this before they made the change to these debit cards from checks. When we started with this transaction at the bank there was no line behind us, but by the end there were at least six people waiting for teller service. I can't begin to describe the inefficiencies of this entire process. But for whatever reason - including living in DC for ten years - I am not surprised. 





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